Alex Esclamado, who started the newspaper the Philippine News in San Francisco 51 years ago and whose vocal opposition to the Marcos government almost led to his financial ruin, died of pneumonia Nov. 4 after a 10-year battle with Parkinson's disease. He was 83.

Mr. Esclamado, who friends said also helped establish a political voice for Filipino Americans, died in the Philippines after returning there last year to reconnect with family. But, his wife Lourdes Mitra Esclamado said, he loved San Francisco and considered it his home.

Mr. Esclamado was born April 2, 1929, in the town of Padre Burgos in the province of Leyte. Trained as a lawyer in the Philippines, he moved to San Francisco with his family in 1959 as the U.S. correspondent for the Manila Chronicle.

In hopes of connecting Filipino Americans, the Esclamados started the Philippine News in 1961, running it out of their Sunset District home initially. When President Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in the Philippines in 1972, the Philippine News became a megaphone for opposition.

In response, officials in the Philippines told businesses to stop advertising in the paper. The Esclamados went into debt to keep publishing, but Mr. Esclamado never wavered, friends said. Associates of Marcos harassed the Esclamado home with constant phone calls, but Mr. Esclamado would only pick up the phone and sing into the receiver, his wife said.

The Marcos government eventually offered him millions of dollars to stop publishing, but he declined.

"Not too many people, when you lose everything and have a chance to recover everything - that was so inspiring," said Rodel Rodis, who knew Mr. Esclamado for 35 years and writes a column for the Philippine News.

Friends and family described Mr. Esclamado as an outgoing man who would accomplish whatever he put his mind to. During his decades of community organizing, he collected and delivered food for striking Filipino farm laborers and lobbied Congress to increase the quota for Filipino immigrants and to grant citizenship to Filipino World War II veterans.

"Everybody had a connection with him," Rodis said. "He was as comfortable with people who were very wealthy and very powerful as he was with common people."

It was his Catholic faith that kept him determined to do the right thing, his wife said.

"For me he was like a torch, a light," said Loida Nicolas Lewis, who succeeded Mr. Esclamado as head of the organization. "He was always able to get practical solutions."

In receiving the Philippine Legion of Honor in 1989, he was credited with defending democracy, revealing the truth about the Marcos dictatorship and successfully advocating a new U.S. policy toward the Philippines.